Joan Szymko is an American choral conductor, music educator and composer. She was born in Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

 and studied choral conducting and music education at the University of Illinois at Urbana

Urbana, Illinois

Urbana is the county seat of Champaign County, Illinois, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population was 41,250. Urbana is the tenth-most populous city in Illinois outside of the Chicago metropolitan area....

, graduating in 1978. She settled in Seattle, Washington, and worked as a music teacher, composer and choral conductor.

In 1993 Szymko took a position directing the Aurora Chorus in Portland

Portland, Oregon

Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...

, Oregon

Oregon

Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

. She founded the women's choir Viriditas Vocal Ensemble in 1994. Szymko composed the music for the Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 musical Do Jump! and Jan Mahler's play Most Dangerous Women.

Works

Szymko composes mainly for theater and choral ensembles. Selected works include:

• All Works of Love
• The Call
• Carpe Diem
• Ein grosser Gesang (text: poems by Rainer Maria Rilke)
• Entro en la vida (text: by Teresa of Avilaz)
• The Freshness (text: Rumi)
• Hear Me! We Are One
• Herbst (text: Ranier M Rilke)
• How Did the Rose (text: Hafiz)
• I Lift My Eyes
• I Dream a World (text: poem by Langston Hughes)
• Illumina la tenebre (text: St Francis of Assisi)
• It Takes a Village (text: West African adage)

Her music has been recorded and issued on CD, including:

• Openings (Audio CD, 1998) Virga Records
• 2010 IMEA Honors Chorus & All-State Chorus (Audio CD - Mar 31, 2010) Mark Records
• Texas Music Educators Association 2008: All-State Women's and Men's Choir (Audio CD - Apr 1, 2008) Mark Records
• Consecrate: the Place and Day to Music (Audio CD - Oct 2, 2007) Mark Records
• Faces of a Woman (Audio CD - Jan 8, 2008) MD&G Records
• Cradle of Fire: A Tribute to the Women of World War II (Audio CD - Dec 14, 2004) Indiannapolis Women's Label

External links

• List of works